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spiced pumpkin cranberry nut loaf

So Dorie calls this the all-in-one holiday Bundt but seeing as the holidays are well over, I used mainly seasonal leftovers and cooked it in a loaf tin, I’m calling it the Holiday Hangover Loaf. Got a nice ring to it doesn’t it. It’s not the type of recipe I would normally go for, especially out of the amazing 300 recipes crammed into Greenspan’s BAKING From my home to yours but my mother has been hankering after it for weeks now so I thought I best keep her sweet.

I had a few cups of fresh cranberries stashed in the freezer from when I realised on Christmas Eve that I didn’t need two bucket loads of Nigella’s Redder than Red Cranberry Sauce (just one). The can of pumpkin was surplus from Halloween (!) when I insisted I would make another one of those velvety pumpkin pies and well… never did. And the mixed nuts were still hanging around in a Ziploc bag, confined to their shells, tipped out of the nut bowl on Twelfth Night (who can ever be bothered to crack those things) never to be thought of again.

Well all I can say is, what a pleasant surprise! Seems like the old adage still holds true and mother does know best. This cake is delicious! It’s hearty and rustic and smells divine. Moist spiced pumpkin bread, studded with sweet apple and tart cranberries (the fresh cranberries are seriously amazing) all balanced out with the abundant crunch and indulgence of the assorted nuts. Slice it in thick tawny wedges and the bright ruby red cranberries and sizeable chunks of nut sell themselves! Serve it on its own or if you’re feeling particularly extravagant (in that farm house kind of way), lashings of butter.

I think this loaf actually gets better with age as I found that with the high fruit content, it was quite moist and almost fragile on the day I baked it. After a night in the fridge however, it firmed up nicely and I can imagine you could even toast it too as is popular with banana and coconut ‘breads’ in Australia. Apparently it freezes beautifully, although it didn’t last long enough in mother’s house to try that – maybe next time!

4 thoughts on “spiced pumpkin cranberry nut loaf”

Your blog just makes me so happy! I love the way you write–“thick tawny wedges” and “lashings of butter.” Also, it’s like you read my mind. I have half a bag of leftover fresh cranberries in my fridge and a barely opened can of pumpkin in my freezer that I really should use! Could this have come at a better time? I think not🙂